Posts Tagged Ballard Is Dead

J.G. Ballard (1930 – 2009)

Posted by mistergroonk in Books, People Who Died on April 22, 2009

ballardian

Before the success of Empire of the Sun Ballard was known principally for darkly surreal novels such as The Crystal World (1966), which described a West African country undergoing an inexplicable process of petrifaction, and Crash (1973), in which he put forward the idea that modern society finds traffic accidents erotic. Despising the term science fiction, Ballard never used it, preferring to describe his work as “apocalyptic”.

You must follow the Telegraph’s link to learn the rest.

Sadly, the only works in which we were familiar when Ballard was alive was Empire of the Sun, and that was the Spielberg version. In our youth, that movie was Atlas readjusting his footing. It forever shifted our world vision.

Knowing now what we do about the loss of so much rich material when translating a book to the movie format, we feel a moral imperative to absorb all his apocalyptic visions.

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